Publications

Here are my latest publications from around the web. Brock Pierce defends Bitcoin Foundation election Newly elected Bitcoin Foundation board director Brock Pierce has written to the Bitcoin Foundation stating that he will not step down. In a letter obtained by the Wall Street Journal, he made clear his anger over the protest resignations of other members. 717 words Bitcoin blockchain used to prove creative ownership Proof of existence is a new online service that aims to provide a novel use for the Bitcoin blockchain. Rather than being a way to transfer funds, the service provides a way to prove when a file came into existence. Could this be a way to reduce to copyright system down into an algorithm in the same way that Bitcoin has done with finance? 521...

Here are my latest publications from around the web. eBay CEO confirms bitcoin is 'on the radar' eBay recently held its annual shareholder meeting in San Jose. Afterwards, CEO Jon Donahoe held a Q and A session in which he was put on the spot about competitors, policies, and more importantly … Bitcoin. 326 words Coinbase supports MIT initiative with bitcoin giveaway We recently reported on the social experiment being done at MIT, whereby a whole Bitcoin ecosystem would be created for undergraduate students to take part in. As a follow-up to this, Coinbase has has offered 0 worth of bitcoin to students who sign up to the service. 285 words Circle launches bitcoin banking services Circle, a Boston-based bitcoin startup, has just revealed plans for a no-free bitcoin banking service. These plans were announced on the company’s blog and showcased at the Bitcoin 2014 conference which is currently being held in Amsterdam. 534 words Prypto resurrects the idea of physical bitcoin transfer Irish startup Prypto is developing cryptocurrency scratch cards, which could be purchased from brick-and-mortar retailers. The idea behind this is to turn the intangible cryptocurrencies into a tangible physical product, which has been attempted before. In fact, BitBill even tried to patent the idea. Can Prypto succeed where others have failed? The idea of using scratch cards to physically transfer intangible assets is not new. They were once in widespread use for Pay as you Go mobile phone plans, and can still be purchased to this day. 441 words CeX replaces the Pound with Bitcoin in Glasgow CeX, who started paying out in Bitcoin last month, has been sounding the call for Scottish independence today. CeX, is a bring-and-buy retail chain in the UK, and has an international website where customers can buy and sell their games and gadgets, respectively from and to the company. The company tied the official launch of its Bitcoin payments to the debate on Scottish independence today, hoping that it would create a Bitcoin high-street experiment with its branch in Sauchiehall in Glasgow. 406 words Facebook shows maturing attitude to users and developers » Techly Facebook’s recent F8 developer conference brought with it a slew of landmark changes from the social...

Here are my latest publications from around the web. Chinese exchanges pull out of Bitcoin sumit The Global Bitcoin Summit, which will be held May 10th to 11th at the China National Convention Center, has lost five important attendees – all of whom are CEOs of Chinese crypto exchanges. The Chinese entrepreneurs pulled out of the conference after they were made to close their accounts by various Chinese banks. 638 words 24K donated to flooded Sean's Outpost Satoshi’s Forest, the Pensacola homeless sanctuary also known as Sean’s Outpost, as suffered severe damage after widespread flooding affected the local area. In response, the charity has opened requests for donations of Bitcoin and Litecoin to help with the rebuilding efforts. 483 words Printing circuits at home? It's now possible, and not just for engineers » Techly An Australian Kickstarter project that promises 3D printing of electric circuits has reached a massive 37K, 458% of its funding goal. Could we now build electronic devices at home, and what does this promise us? 706 words First Time Ultrabook. David Gilson’s Experience « Ultrabook News and the Ultrabook Database While Microsoft is going all-in with its “Modern UI”, the dual nature of Windows 8 is still trying the patience of many. This is partly due to the fact that most consumer laptops lack a touchscreen. Fortunately, Chippy was kind enough to loan me his 2013 Harris Beach developer Ultrabook after seeing me bemoan the “dual nature” of Windows 8. Here’s how a touchscreen device has changed my feelings about Redmond’s tiled interface. 1684...

Here are my latest publications from around the web. Bitcoin Foundation to run second round of elections The Bitcoin Foundation’s election to find two directors for its industry seats has closed, but failed to find any outright winning candidates, under the terms of the foundation’s bylaws. 473 words Bloomberg adds Bitcoin price tracking Bloomberg has announced that it will now provide Bitcoin price tracking on its financial data terminals. The data will be available via its professional services which has over 320,000 subscribers. 648 words MIT to give undergrads $100 in Bitcoin It was announced today that two students from the Massachusetts Institute for Technology (MIT) have raised half a million US dollars to be converted to bitcoins and distributed among undergraduate students in the next autumn term. 425 words Paym brings mobile payments to UK The banking industry of the UK today announced a new payment system called Paym. This system will enable UK residents to send and receive bank transfers by just using a mobile phone number, rather than the somewhat more involved process of entering an account number and sort code. 480 words Bitnodes.io indicates 60 day decline in Bitcoin nodes Data gathered by Bitnodes.io shows that the number of Bitcoin nodes is declining. Bitnodes is a data-driven website funded by the Bitcoin Foundation, and services to display a map of Bitcoin network nodes across the world. 554 words Bitcoin Retail Point of Sale systems One issue holding bitcoin back from wider-spread adoption is the lack of businesses that accept the digital currency as payment. This is a chicken-and-egg problem. If more businesses had the ability to accept bitcoin, it might encourage consumers to start obtaining and spending it, and vice versa. 1121 words Seedcoin incubator announces second round of startup funding The Bitcoin based venture capitol seeding fund, “Seedcoin”, has announced its latest round of funding. The startups included in this round include several financial services plus a few surprise entrants. 691...

Here are my latest publications from around the web. Bitcoin Foundation election nears to a close The Bitcoin Foundation is currently holding an election to fill the two board seats that were left vacant from the resignations of its industry board members, Charlie Shrem and Mark Karpeles. Voting opened on April 21st and will close shortly. 411 words Feathercoin undergoes a hard fork Feathercoin, the UK based Scrypt currency, has undergone a hard fork on block 204,639 of its block chain. This change addresses drastic swings in the difficulty level caused by mining pools who switch between multiple currencies, and it also implements a fix to the OpenSSL Heartbleed vulernability. The fork involves a mandatory update to version 0.8.6.2 of the Feathercoin desktop wallet, which follows a fix to the Android wallet app. 593 words Localbitcoins resolves investigation into stolen bitcoin – CoinBuzz During the Easter Weekend, the Localbitcoins team updated its blog with the results of its investigation into the reported losses from the Bitcoin exchange, as we reported earlier. All but one of the incidents of theft were apparently from accounts which were not using 2-Factor Authentication, followed by an explanation of vulnerability for the one 2-Factor authenticated account that did suffer from theft. 508 words Vault of Satoshi launches public audit system – CoinBuzz Canadian exchange, “Vault of Satoshi”, has just launched its public auditing service and demonstrated its proof of solvency. In March, the Canadian company received a full Money Services Business licence to operate in all provinces of Canada and international customers in certain countries. 663 words How to calculate mining profitability Are you serious about mining cryptocurrencies? If so, you need to know how to make the best use of your money and equipment. In this guide, we’ll show you how to mine your digital treasure in the most profitable way. 1515 words How to Make a Paper Wallet for Bitcoin One of the most popular options for keeping your bitcoins safe is something called a paper wallet. Here we explain how to transfer all those digital coins into a physical paper form using just a printer. 1177...

Here are my latest publications from around the web. Localbitcoins investigating bitcoin thefts and malware – CoinBuzz Localbitcoins is currently investigating claims of account vulnerability in response to a user who went to Reddit and the Localbitcoin forums to report the theft of bitcoins from their Localbitcoins account. 467 words Second hand store CeX to payout in bitcoin – CoinBuzz CeX, a UK based bring and buy website and retail chain as begun offering bitcoin in exchange for goods on its website. The news was reported by a user on the Bitcoin section of Reddit (vernacular: “subreddit”), with a screenshot of the website offering bitcoin as one of several reimbursement methods for selling used products to the company. 527 words UK exchange Coinfloor to invite public audits – CoinBuzz Coinfloor, London’s only Bitcoin exchange which was established in 2013, has today announced a raft of new features, including its “proof of solvency”, making it the world’s first publicly auditable Bitcoin exchange. Additionally, the exchange announced 0% fees for the first 60 days of trading and an “over the counter” (OTC) trading system for large bitcoin trades. 474 words French chain Monoprix to accept bitcoin – CoinBuzz Monoprix, a major French retail chain based in Clichy, France, has announced support for Bitcoin. The company’s director, Patrick Qualid, formally announced the decision, and how it was influenced by the simplicity offered by digital currencies. 226 words Feathercoin wallet fix now available – CoinBuzz Feathercoin, the Scrypt enabled altcurrency based in Oxford UK, has issued an updated wallet on the Google Play Store. Over the past few weeks, the original client had become unable to synchronise with the Feathercoin network, denying users access to their funds. 363 words Corkett takes on eBay and Craigslist with Bitcoin – CoinBuzz A Bitcoin based classifieds site, Corkett, aimed at tackling the shortcomings of eBay and Craigslist, will soon be launched. Cokrett.com is a New York based start-up, which is aiming to create a highly localised buy and sell market for its users. 430 words Take Awesome Astronomy Photos with a Smartphone and a Telescope If you’re eager to start photographing the night sky, but you want to do so on a budget, it can be...